What LED to choose?

Douggie-Style said:
So White and Blue LEDs do not contain green?

I thought white is full spectrum?
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Different whites (temperature rating) contain different amounts of each color. I'll try and get a decent video tomorrow of my fixture when you leave out red or green. It makes a big difference. That is with cool white LEDs though.
 
That would be great!!!

I think the new dimmable has green and red. Joe said I used to b an upgrade that they called a.....403?

He said that the new standard light is much better without changing a thing, so I think I will do as he says.

There are some other great videos on Utube of the Apollo LEDs and AI and there is even a great comparison as well!!!
 
I disagree with the idea being put forward that red and green LEDs are need to provide a full spectrum of light. Here are the light spectrum by both the AI and Radion.

AI Sol (white right, blue left)

perf_spectral.png



Ecotech Radion

radionspectrum-right.png



For ecotech having independent LEDs to achieve full spectrum, it seems to be much more geared towards the blue end of the spectrum than "full" whereas the AI appears to offer a more diverse color spectrum at more equal intensities.

Here is also a good read. The radion power consumption appears to be much more than the AI and the light output seems less, even considering distribution with wider optics.

http://www.h2oplusomething.com/inde...-vertex-illumina&catid=40:equipment&Itemid=64
 
That has been up on reef central for a while. His (Jeremy) par numbers for the radion are pretty drastically lower than anyone else's around the web. Not sure why and I don't care to speculate as Jeremy is "good people".

All it takes is looking at a tank that has been running any AI sol for a while to see that their spectrum is lacking. Washed out reds, blues, yellows, oranges. But hey green coral looks great under the Sol Blue.
 
Douggie-Style said:
That would be great!!!

I think the new dimmable has green and red. Joe said I used to b an upgrade that they called a.....403?

He said that the new standard light is much better without changing a thing, so I think I will do as he says.

There are some other great videos on Utube of the Apollo LEDs and AI and there is even a great comparison as well!!!
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Sounds like they are indeed adding the red and green LEDs then. I wonder if the new dimmable will have each channel separated. If they are using the apex as the only controller I would think its pretty possible. That apex is a pretty powerful controller.
 
The new fixture still only has 3 plugs, moonlight, blue, white. I doubt the extra colors will be controllable separately.
 
FishBeard said:
The new fixture still only has 3 plugs, moonlight, blue, white. I doubt the extra colors will be controllable separately.
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The AIs only have one plug (and power supply each) and its all controllable. The channels aren't separated by physical circuits. The apex sends the signal via 3.5mm cable to the data port on the fixture.
 
jcarlilesiu said:
The AIs only have one plug (and power supply each) and its all controllable. The channels aren't separated by physical circuits. The apex sends the signal via 3.5mm cable to the data port on the fixture.
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The Radion is the same way, but if there are separate plugs like Fishbeard said it seems like they are just using regular dimmable drivers and hiding them within the unit.

I also wanted to add that you don't NEED Red/Green LEDs to achieve a full spectrum. You can achieve the same thing by using a blend of Neutural and Warm White LEDs but it would take significantly more of them to achieve the same effect as one red and one green LED.

There is speculation that AI will be offering pucks for the SOL that include a warm white LED instead of the cool white LED so you can swap out a few of those to improve the OE.

To make the point without even comparing the SOL to the Radion which is what this seems to have become look at "the reefer's" tank. He had just cool white/RB LEDs before and his tank looked alright, but many colors were washed out. He added a single red LED and things really started to look WOW for lack of a better descriptor. One green LED and he'll be good to go. He could have swapped out a significant portion of his whites for warm white but that would have been as the cost of usable PAR and possibly overall tank appearance.

You can also look at T5 bulbs. There is a reason that people add a Purple+ or Fiji Purple to their T5 array. It just makes things look better!
 
SkullV said:
There is speculation that AI will be offering pucks for the SOL that include a warm white LED instead of the cool white LED so you can swap out a few of those to improve the OE.
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I have been looking around to see if these are available yet. I have a total of 32 pucks over my 150, so swapping out a few with the warm white might make a significant change for the better, and at only $25 a puck, very affordable.

If you see anything, let me know.
 
jcarlilesiu said:
I have been looking around to see if these are available yet. I have a total of 32 pucks over my 150, so swapping out a few with the warm white might make a significant change for the better, and at only $25 a puck, very affordable.

If you see anything, let me know.
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Will do, I would be concerned with the Warm White in your Sol White fixtures though. I guess if you get pucks with a single warm white and two blues that would be a good balance though.
 
Has anyone heard anything about the EShine 4G series? I've seen good things with their original lights, but it looks like they're revamping their product.
 
Funlad3 said:
Then, the full spectrum craze, justly, came into play. Suddenly, RB and CW/WW LEDs became obsolete, again, justly. Suddenly, the Stark LED lights aren't one of the best choices. Me being me, I kept contact with my sales rep. from Eshine Systems. Sure enough, early this October, I received an email about their new 4G series that will soon be coming out. By then however, I was looking to do a DIY LED build. Just this weekend, I decided that the cost would be WAY high (around $1000 from Rapid LED) and looked back at that email. Here's what I read:


So, what do you all think?
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No first hand experience, but the few reviews I have seen on E. Shine products lay them in there with the rest of the "cheap" Chinese fixtures. A lot of cooling problems and diode burnout reported. If a "black box" fixture is what you are looking for I would look at the Apollo fixtures.
 
That's strange, because all of the reviews I've seen from them have been great. There's obviously something missing here, but they have a three year warranty; so I think that they'll be all right even if they do break. (Which I doubt.)

Is there much of a performance difference between CREE and Brigelux? I understand that their RB and W/CW/WW are different from each other's, but are either more likely to burn out, shift in color, or overheat? Clearly because of cost, I'm leaning towards the Bridgelux. :)

Thanks!
 
Lets put it this way, 48 CREE chips, heatsink, optics, dimmable drivers, controller, and enclosure all for just a tad bit over $200... If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. And nothing personal, but your post REALLY came off like you are an E.Shine salesman...
 
Funlad3 said:
That's strange, because all of the reviews I've seen from them have been great. There's obviously something missing here, but they have a three year warranty; so I think that they'll be all right even if they do break. (Which I doubt.)

Is there much of a performance difference between CREE and Brigelux? I understand that their RB and W/CW/WW are different from each other's, but are either more likely to burn out, shift in color, or overheat? Clearly because of cost, I'm leaning towards the Bridgelux. :)

Thanks!
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It sounds like your mind is already made up, so why ask? I would be interested in reading some of the positive reviews if you can link them. Let me know when you get them I would love to get some first hand PAR readings.

To answer your other question, Cree is a higher quality higher output (in terms of efficiency) diode but I find it very very hard to believe that you are getting genuine CREE diodes at that price (not uncommon to get knockoffs in the direct from China fixtures).
 
Sorry guys, I'm coming across as a stubborn jerk today. Even in person. I'll edit my original post so that it doesn't sound so much like an advertisement.

Skull, thanks for all of your help today, and like you guessed, my mind is basically made up... I was just wondering if you had any first hand experiences with this company, because I'd rather get information from someone who I have communicated with than people from months old threads. I'll PM you some of the successes I've seen BTW. :)
 
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